Build it Up to Break it Down Again
by ParvisSira
Summary: Thomas isn't a hero...he's just human. A Black Swan introspective piece, slight AU.


AN: Inspired by a quotation of Vincent Cassel's on IMDB. Doesn't belong to me at all. Slight AU.

_People pretend to be nice, people pretend to be smooth, and polite and everything, but this is only an appearance because the way we're built as human beings is only in paradox and contradictions. So I guess, you know, when I read so-called baddies, I think they're more human than heroes most of the time._

It was the only way he knew how to get the most out of his ballerinas. To be principal they needed the technique but they also needed the heart. Technique was the triumph of discipline over the flesh—that achingly fragile flesh. Heart was something that was his gift. Sometimes they had it, but he preferred when he could induce it. His creations where almost an extension of him and they portrayed his vision so much better.

His ballerinas were like flowers, so often their bloom of youth wilted and withered under the pressure but sometimes—the truly great—revealed a strong steel core underneath that was more beautiful than the original bloom. It remained to be seen if Nina would wilt and wither or if she had that inner strength to survive.

Thomas was far more aware of the currents and undertones of the company than people thought. And he had been planning to replace Beth for longer than people realized. Beth had been one of his original creations, hard as it was to believe she once was just as technically perfect and lacking in confidence and heart as Nina was. Thomas took her and molded her into a creature of passion, into a creature of heart, into a dancer that set the stage alight.

She was magnificent, but as she aged she lost some of that technique. And so Thomas did what he did best, he set her against Nina. Told her how frigid she was, told her who she was all technique and no heart—and that set Beth into a fright because she remembered back when she was all technique and frigid. Beth remembered back when she was Nina and she so she pushed and worked and got scared. Thomas knew that one season with Nina as the Swan Queen would push Beth to her magnificent best in her farewell performance. If only his Little Princess hadn't been so foolish to destroy herself before the end it would have been the best performance of her career.

And Thomas had been watching Nina for a while too...he knew exactly who was going to be the Swan Queen, but he needed her worried, he needed her scared, he needed to push her outside of her comfortable perfect bubble if he was going to make her a star. Bringing in Lily was the beginning; Nina needed someone to see someone who had passion and presence, Nina needed to have the fear that would take her technique to new heights because she didn't know how to respond to competition except by trying to be more perfect.

Telling her he was giving the part to Veronica? That was just a way to make her insecure. Giving Lily the alternate role? That was just a way to make her work harder. Seducing her? That was just the way to give her heart and make her irrevocable his.

After the gala when she went to his apartment, he liked that she lied to him. She was clearly a virgin and so delicately embodied the White Swan it made him giddy with anticipation, the debauching of Nina would make her the best—it would make her amazing and she never would be the same. Nina would dance Swan Lake twice in her career as its start and at its end. She wouldn't have the fragility needed the rest of the time.

Some might call him abusive, some might call him twisted. He called himself honest. The company was his love and he would do whatever it took to make it succeed and fly. And if that meant he slowly pulled his little princess away from the rest of the company, if it meant he made her dependant on him...well the creative direction he got by having someone so suborned to him was addictive and exactly what he needed and if his little princesses went a little crazy? Well, he knew how to manage that and it did only make their dancing better.

Tonight Nina danced the dance of her life, the Swan Queen exactly as he imagined and hoped. Tonight Nina though she had died, but when he called her his Little Princess and pulled her up the blood she thought was spreading across her abdomen wasn't there. The rest of the company thought she was so deep in the role that she got a little confused. Thomas knew that she actually believed she was dying, but tonight he would take her to his bed and build her up again and every night the Swan Queen was open she would go through this torture, every night she would believe that she died.

After all, Thomas knew how to get the best out of his ballerinas—even if it destroyed them in the process.


End file.
